The Batman (2022)

I like Batman. I think you know I like Batman. In fact, I spent a month last year telling you just how much I like Batman. And so it should probably come as no surprise that I really liked The Batman, helmed by Matt Reeves and starring Robert Pattinson as the broodiest Dark Knight yet. The Batman is overwhelmingly confident, hypnotic at three hours long and entirely refreshing compared to what Batman has been before. 

Two years into his war on crime, Bruce Wayne (Robert Pattinson) has turned the mantle of the Batman into a figure of fear, of dark vengeance in a city nevertheless still overwhelmed by crime. When the mayor is murdered, The Riddler (Paul Dano) announces his intention to do what Batman never could and rid the city of its lawless infestation. As Batman races to expose a criminal conspiracy, he finds unlikely leads in the form of a slinky cat burglar (Zoë Kravitz), a mobster lieutenant (Colin Farrell), and his own trusty butler (Andy Serkis).

 

If we learned one lesson from Zack Snyder’s Justice League, it’s that we really should not be arbitrarily cutting comic book movies to a length that fits a studio’s idea of how many screenings per day a theater can accommodate. If a story needs to be four hours long, let it be. If you need three hours to tell a dark detective story introducing three classic Batman villains – by your leave, Mr. Reeves. Especially after proving himself on making two of the best Planet of the Apes movies, with the patently impossible task of making CGI apes endearing and sympathetic, Reeves is a filmmaker who’s never anything less than totally in command. Take his Gotham – at once fully realized and blossoming anew like a pressed flower, revealing itself to an audience as a layered artifact of decay and corruption. Crumbling and desiccated, Reeves’s Gotham sprawls, and while this fanboy will always lament that we never got a franchise out of Ben Affleck’s Batman (then again, never say never), this Gotham is fascinating enough to warrant the myriad spinoffs we’ve already been promised.

 

When it comes to the Dark Knight himself, Robert Pattinson acquits himself well. I had expected him to be playing up the billionaire playboy, not unlike his suave spy turn in Tenet, but this Batman distinguishes himself by leaning hard into the psychological damage that comes with being an obsessive loner vigilante. While I usually like my Batman a little more healed, this younger Bat is certainly a valid interpretation, and Pattinson plays it to the hilt. He’s visibly uncomfortable and morose every time he’s Bruce Wayne, and he’s only standing taller when he’s in the cape and cowl. It’s a fascinating and grim performance, even as we start to see signs that this bat is coming out of his cave.

 

I always say that the problem with modern comic book movies is almost never the casting, and The Batman boasts another well-rounded slate of performers. Zoë Kravitz has a unique take on the character of Catwoman, such that I forgot that this was the same character that Anne Hathaway and Michelle Pfeiffer had played before her. (The less said of Halle Berry’s outing, the better.) As Selina Kyle, Kravitz is knowingly seductive, yet there’s a fantastic character beat that will come as no surprise to fans of the comics, giving Kravitz something truly emotional with which to grapple. Meanwhile, Colin Farrell is literally unrecognizable as The Penguin, such that one almost wonders why they paid for an actor of his caliber; then again, maybe that’s the point – if The Penguin is going to have presence, you need a performer with presence. And then there’s The Riddler, and Paul Dano is spooky and deranged as a criminal mastermind who’s equal parts Zodiac Killer, Jigsaw from the Saw films, and Moriarty all rolled into one. We don’t see Dano for much of the film, ensconced as he is in military surplus and a full-face mask, but there are moments when he channels his There Will Be Blood antagonist in unhinged monologues, to great effect.

 

For the “human” parts – the ones that don’t get colorful aliases – these performances are appropriately more subdued, less flashy. Jeffrey Wright is great fun as Jim Gordon, exasperated and sarcastic. Without being showy about it, Wright builds a deep camaraderie with Pattinson’s Batman, respectful of his mission but willing to poke fun at his methods. After being told not to use his gun, for example, Wright rolls his eyes and tells Batman, “That’s your thing, man.” On the other hand, Andy Serkis as Alfred is a bit of a headscratcher. Compared to some of Serkis’s more recent high-profile franchise roles, there isn’t much for him to do as Alfred, though his clear frustration with his young charge’s calling is a bridge further than Michael Caine’s interpretation. Still, one feels that the material does not quite give Serkis room to soar, and it is in this casting more than any other that I felt I’d have rather been seeing, say, Jeremy Irons.

 

At three hours long, The Batman is an experience, and while it’s the longest Batman film by a mile (or eleven minutes, depending how you measure), it never feels excessive or bloated. There is a third-act turn that does feel a bit like it belongs to a different movie, but it cues up the fulfillment of a number of thematic and character threads in a way that’s immensely satisfying in the way that only comic book spectacle can be. The Batman also goes for broke in a way that many superhero franchise films don’t, and if they’re cuing up the comic book plot that I think they’re invoking (no spoilers), we’re in for a wild ride. If this is the only Batman movie Reeves, Pattinson, and company deliver, they’ve done well to skip the origin and dive right into the heart of Gotham. But I cannot believe we have seen the last of this Batman, and I certainly hope not, too.

 

The Batman is rated PG-13 for “strong violent and disturbing content, drug content, strong language, and some suggestive material.” Directed by Matt Reeves. Written by Matt Reeves and Peter Craig. Based on the DC Comics. Starring Robert Pattinson, Zoë Kravitz, Paul Dano, Jeffrey Wright, John Turturro, Andy Serkis, and Colin Farrell.

Roman J. Israel, Esq. (2017)

Amid my evolution from a trailer addict to a moviegoer who’d almost rather not see a preview for fear of having the whole movie spoiled, along comes Roman J. Israel, Esq., for which I’d seen nary a poster, let alone a trailer. While I’ve been burned more than a few times by trailers that give away an entire plot, this film flew entirely under my radar – all the more surprising, given it stars Denzel “Best Actor” Washington and comes from writer/director Dan Gilroy (who kept me awake one night with that masterfully unnerving Nightcrawler). In hindsight, I’m very glad not to have encountered a trailer for the film – not just because I’ve since learned the trailer unflinchingly gives away all the surprises (honestly, avoid at all costs), but because I genuinely didn’t know what to expect from Roman J. Israel, Esq. and enjoyed it all the more for it.

Denzel Washington stars as the eponymous attorney, self-conscious and awkward despite being a sharp legal mind and a faded major player in the civil rights movement. After his partner takes ill, Roman J. Israel, Esq. finds he must navigate himself into an unfamiliar world, where the legal game is sharkier than ever (epitomized by Colin Farrell’s lean turn as George Pierce) and the social justice game has changed, which Roman learns when he seeks employment with activist Maya (Carmen Ejogo).

Denzel Washington’s performance in and as Roman J. Israel, Esq. is like a great big tree. Not because it’s wooden – far from it, Denzel turns in a nuanced and offbeat performance unlike anything I’ve seen from him and yet irresistibly compelling as we try to figure out what to make of a man like Roman. No, he’s like an enormous tree in that it’s difficult not to stand in amazement at him once you stumble upon this untrumpeted performance. Indeed, there are moments in the film when even the other actors seem to be quite taken by Denzel; the expressions on their faces seem to supplant their scripted dialogue with, “Holy socks, I’m in a scene with Denzel Washington!” Not that I blame them: it’s hard enough merely watching someone else in a scene alongside the perennially mesmerizing Denzel.

As he did in Nightcrawler, Gilroy presents a curious specimen, indisputably a product of his times, and puts him in situations where his moral fiber can be tested. Washington proves himself more than capable of handling a character as demanding as Roman, giving the character weight with which the audience must wrestle. When Roman makes difficult choices, it’s difficult to determine our allegiances because we see Roman as concretely human, entirely understandable and yet somewhat inscrutable. When characters tell Roman about his inspirational value and his legacy as an activist, we buy it, because Denzel wears the history of Roman Israel with as much grace and comfort as he does the character’s trademark afro. (Has an afro been as iconic since Pulp Fiction? You decide.) And in the film’s final moments, Denzel brings to astonishing life the tough choices Roman faces, makes a decision that seems at once bewildering and entirely consistent with his character, and then leaves the final judgment to us. Where it was perhaps easier to render a verdict in Nightcrawler, Roman J. Israel, Esq. ends up more prickly, gladly indigestible.

Roman J. Israel, Esq. is a very strong character study, so I was both surprised and disappointed to see that the trailer cast its titular attorney as an irreverent, speak-his-mind throwback – which, don’t get me wrong, is certainly a part of his character, but it’s a reductionist view that looks only at one set of creative decisions. The film includes one of the most uncomfortable job interviews committed to film, imbued with such heartening pathos as Roman quite literally chokes on his own pride during a job interview and barely stammers his way through handing over a business card. Elsewhere we see the struggle between Roman’s code of conduct and the demands of the world in an encounter with a homeless man, throwing into question issues of perception and how stereotypes lead to false conclusions. Through it all, Denzel & Gilroy are careful to treat Roman with all his intricate layers rather than stack personality traits without understanding the core of the character.

One of the standout sequences of Roman J. Israel, Esq. takes its protagonist to the beach for a sequence which is entirely wordless, save for a moment when Roman orders a gourmet doughnut. It’s the sort of scene that, in nearly any other movie, would have been filler, designed to hawk a hit single on the soundtrack or pad out a runtime by trying to seem deep. But Denzel & Gilroy find ways to make the scene immensely potent, calling back to a throwaway one-liner and turning it into a turning point for the character. I can’t remember the last time a doughnut figured so pivotally into a film’s plot (think Forest Whitaker scarfing down evidence in Taken 3, but those were bagels), but then I can’t remember a film that snuck up on me like Roman J. Israel, Esq. did. I can’t remember the last time a command performance like Denzel’s singlehandedly elevated a movie that might otherwise have been lightly unmemorable and turned it into a late-season must-see. But then, I don’t know what else I could have expected from Denzel Washington.

Roman J. Israel, Esq. is rated PG-13 for “language and some violence.” Written and directed by Dan Gilroy. Starring Denzel Washington, Colin Farrell, and Carmen Ejogo.

Monday at the Movies - January 6, 2014

Welcome to the first edition of “Monday at the Movies” in 2014.  We’re going into our third year with this feature; can you believe it?

Seven Psychopaths (2012) – In Bruges was a delightful surprise, marketed as a gangster comedy but actually a contemplative take on guilt with a stellar script.  With Seven Psychopaths, Martin McDonagh is at it again with another thoughtful film, though its slow burn might not appeal to everyone.  Colin Farrell stars as a screenwriter suffering from a creative block, while Sam Rockwell and Christopher Walken play dognappers who cross gangster Woody Harrelson by abducting his Shih Tzu.  The marketing bills this movie as a wacky slapstick action comedy, but the result is something much more sincere, a metafictional take on stories and endings.  But along the way, McDonagh doesn’t forget to let his cast have fun; Walken proves himself the king of the stammered non sequitur with many hilarious lines and outbursts, while no one does increasingly unhinged like Sam Rockwell.  I’m inclined to label the movie “smart” because of the way it’s structured, calling back to previous scenes and letting the audience figure certain plot details out without spoonfeeding them, but then there’s a legitimate problem with the film’s female characters.  There aren’t many of them, and all of them either take their clothes off or get killed (or both); the film seems aware of this when Farrell’s character is chastised for the poor quality of the female characters in his screenplay – another moment of clever metafictional play – but I’m not sure that self-awareness lets one off the hook, and indeed it might even exacerbate a problem by calling attention to it without attempting to rectify it.  But compelling if problematic, Seven Psychopaths manages to entertain, which in the final analysis is really all I ask of a film.

Happy New Year!  That does it for this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.”  Don’t forget to come back tomorrow for the Double-Oh-Seventh of the month (and boy is it a doozy)!